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THE PRACTICAL 
EDUCATION 

DAVID STARR JORDAN 




DAVID STARR JORDAN 

From a portrait by Mrs. Emma Curtis Richardson 



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THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION. 

A PRACTICAL education is one which can be 
made effective in life. We often abuse the 
word practical by making it synonymous 
with temporary or superficial. It should 
mean just the opposite. An education which takes but 
little time and less effort, and leads at once to a paying 
situation, is not practical. It is not good, because it 
will never lead to anything better. An education 
which does not disclose the secret of power is un- 
worthy the name. Nothing is really practical which 
does not provide for growth in effectiveness. There 
is nothing more practical than knowledge, nothing 
more unpractical than ignorance; nothing more prac- 
tical than sunshine, nothing less so than darkness. 
The chief essentials of education should be thorough- 
ness and fitness. The most thorough training is the 
most practical, provided only that it is fitted to the 
end in view. The essential fault of educational sys- 
tems of the past is that, in search for breadth and 
thoroughness, the element of fitness was forgotten. 
We have tried, as we used to say, to make well- 
rounded men, "men who stand four-square to every 
wind that blows." This is a training better fitted for 
hitching-posts or windmills than for men. This is the 
day of special knowledge. Only by doing some one 
thing better than any one else, can a man find a worthy 



THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION 



place in our complex social fabric. The ability to do 
a hundred things in an inferior way will not help him. 
This is a fact our schools must recognize. No man is 
great by chance in these days. If one is to do any- 
thing of importance he must first understand what he 
is to do, and then set about it with all his might. 

Men of affairs often sneer at college men and col- 
lege methods. Some of their criticisms are justified, 
others not. Such justification as they may have had 
is found in the lack of fitness in college training. 
Among conditions of life infinitely varied the college 
has decreed that all boys should take the same studies, 
in the same way, and at the same time, and that these 
studies should be the routine of the English boy of a 
century ago. In thus repeating the thoughts and 
learning of nations half forgotten, the minds of some 
"Greek-minded" and "Roman-minded" men were 
stimulated to their highest activity, and for them such 
training was good and adequate. 

But there were some, "American-minded" perhaps, 
whose powers were not awakened by such influences, 
These came forth from the college walls into the life 
of the world, as Rip Van Winkle from the Catskills, 
dazed by the new experiences to which their studies 
had given no clue. 

I do not wish to depreciate the value of classical 
training. There is a higher point of view than that of 
mere utility, and the beautiful forms and noble thoughts 
of ancient literature have been a lifelong source of 
inspiration to thousands who have made no direct use 



THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION 



of their college studies in the affairs of life. But there 
are other sources of inspiration which, in their way, 
may effect many to whom Latin or Greek would be a 
meaningless grind. For such as these a different train- 
ing is necessary, if our education is to be practical. 
The schools of the future will avoid not only bad train- 
ing, but also "misfit" training ; for the time of the stu- 
dent is so precious that no part of it should be wrongly 
used. 

The remedy for the evils of misfit training is not to 
discard the high standards or the thorough drill of the 
old college, but to apply it to a wider range of studies. 
No two students are ever quite alike, and no two will 
ever follow exactly the same career. If we work to the 
best advantage, no two will ever follow the same course 
of study. And thus recognizing in our efforts the 
infinite variations of human nature, the work of higher 
education acquires an effectiveness which it could never 
have under the cast-iron systems of the traditional col- 
lege. Misfit training is good only as compared with no 
training at all. Any sort of activity is better than 
stagnation. 

The purpose of right training is to prepare for work 
which is to last. There is enough already of poor and 
careless work. Whatever is done needs to be done 
well. Let it be done honestly — not as to-day's make- 
shift, but as done for all time. 

High under the roof of the Cathedral of Cologne 
there is many an image carved in stone and wrought 
with the most exquisite care, but which human eye has 



THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION 



never seen since it was first placed in the niche in which 
it stands. This work of the Gothic sculptors was done 
for the sight of God, and not for the worship of man. 
The Cathedral of Cologne was almost a thousand years 
in building. I saw, the other day, a cathedral in one 
of our Eastern cities, built in barely as many weeks as 
the other in centuries. The marble sculptures on its 
lofty towers are made of sheet-iron, zinc-lined, and 
painted to represent stone. Such is the work of mod- 
ern cathedral builders. But the slow-moving centuries 
will show the difference. 

A Swiss watchmaker said the other day: "Your 
American manufacturers cannot establish themselves in 
Europe. The first sample you send is all right, the 
second lot begins to drop off, the third destroys your 
reputation, and the fourth puts an end to your trade. 
All you seem to care for is to make money. What you 
want is some pride in your work." If this has been 
true of American watchmakers, it should be true no 
longer. The work that lasts must be not the quickest, 
but the best. Let it be done, not to require each year 
a fresh coat of paint, but done as if to last forever, and 
some of it will endure. This world is crowded on its 
lower floor, but higher up for centuries to come there 
will still remain a niche for each piece of honest work. 

"Profligacy," says Emerson, "consists not in spend- 
ing, but in spending off the line of your career. The 
crime which bankrupts men and States is job work, 
declining from your main design to serve a turn here 
or there. Nothing is beneath you, if in the direction of 



THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION 



your life ; nothing, to you, is great or desirable, if it be 
off from that." 

The test of civilization is the saving of labor. The 
great economic waste of the world is that involved in 
unskilled labor. The gain of the nineteenth century 
over the eighteenth is the gain of skill in workmanship. 
But with all our progress in labor-saving, we have yet 
far to go before our use of labor shall balance our 
waste of it. The work which goes to waste in Europe, 
even now, through lack of training and lack of proper 
tools, is greater than all the losses through wars and 
standing armies and the follies of hereditary caste. It 
is second only to the waste due to idleness itself. For 
idleness there is no remedy so effective as training. To 
know how to do is to have a pride and pleasure in 
doing. In the long run, there is no force making for 
virtue and sobriety so strong as the influence of skill. 

If a man knows how to do and how to act, he is 
assured against half the dangers which beset life. 
Training of the hand, training of the mind, training 
of any kind, which gives the man the power to do 
something which he knows to be genuine, gives him 
self-respect, makes a man of him, not a tool, or a force, 
or a thing. 

An unskilled laborer is a relic of past ages and con- 
ditions. He is a slave in a time when enforced slavery 
is past. The waste which comes from doing poor 
things in poor ways keeps half of humanity forever 
poor. What the unskilled man can do, a bucket of coal 
and a bucket of water, guided by "a thimbleful of 



THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION 



brains," will do more effectively. It is the mission of 
industrial training to put an end to unskilled labor ; to 
make each workman a free man. When the time shall 
come when each workman can use his powers to the 
best advantage we shall have an end to the labor prob- 
lem. The final answer of the labor problem is that each 
should solve it for himself. 

I have spoken of the training of the hand; but all 
training belongs to the brain, and all kinds of training 
are of like nature. The hand is the servant of the brain, 
and can receive nothing of itself. There is no such 
thing as manual training as distinguished from train- 
ing of the intellect. There is brain behind every act of 
the hand. The muscles are the mind's only servants. 
Whether we speak of training an orator, a statesman, 
or a merchant, or a mechanic, the same language must 
be used. The essential is that the means should lead 
toward the end to be reached. 

An ignorant man is a man who has fallen behind our 
civilization and cannot avail himself of his light. He 
finds himself in darkness, in an unknown land. He 
stumbles over trifling obstacles because he does not 
understand them. He cannot direct his course. The 
real dangers are all hidden, while the most innocent 
rock or bush seems a menacing giant. He is not 
master of the situation. We have but one life to live ; 
let that be an effective one, not one that wastes at every 
turn through the loss of knowledge or lack of skill. 
What sunlight is to the eye education is to the intellect, 
and the most thorough education is always the most 



THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION 



practical. No traveler is contented to go about with a 
lantern when he could as well have the sun. If he can 
have a compass and a map also, so much the better. 
But let his equipment be fitting. Let him not take an 
ax if there be no trees to chop, nor a boat unless he is 
to cross a river, nor a Latin grammar if he is to deal 
with bridge-building, unless the skill obtained by 
mastering the one gives him insight into the other. 

I often meet parents who wish to give their sons a 
practical education. They think of practical as some- 
thing cheap and easy. A little drawing, a little tinker- 
ing with machinery, a little bookkeeping of imaginary 
accounts, and their sons are "ready for business." 
"Ready for business," as though the complex problems 
of finance were to be solved by a knowledge of book- 
keeping by double-entry! Life is more serious than 
that. It takes a thorough education to make a suc- 
cessful business man. Not the education of the 
schools, we say, — and it may be so ; but if so, it is 
the fault of the schools. They ought to make good 
business men as well as to make good men in any other 
profession. They ought to fit men for life. Why do 
the great majority of merchants fail? Is it not be- 
cause they do not know how to succeed? Is it not 
because they have not the brains and the skill to com- 
pete with those who had both brains and training? Is 
it not because they do not realize that there are laws 
of finance and commerce as inexorable as the law of 
gravitation? A man will stand erect because he stands 
in accord with the law of gravitation. A man or a 



THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION 



nation will grow rich by working in accord with the 
laws which govern the accumulation of health. If there 
are such laws, men should know them. What men 
must know the schools can teach. 

The schools will indeed do a great work if they teach 
the existence of law. Half the people of America be- 
lieve this is a world of chance. Half of them believe 
they are victims of bad luck when they receive the re- 
wards of their own stupidity. Half of them believe 
that they are favorites of fortune, and will be helped 
out somehow, regardless of what they may do. Now 
and then some man catches a falling apple, picks up a 
penny from the dust, or a nugget from the gulch. 
Then his neighbors set to looking into the sky for 
apples, or into the dust for pennies, as though pennies 
and apples come in that way. Waiting for chances 
never made anybody rich. The Golden Age of Cali- 
fornia began when gold no longer came by chance. 
There is more gold in the black adobe of the Santa 
Clara Valley than existed in the whole great range of 
the Sierras until men sought for it, not by luck or 
chance, but by system and science. Whatever is worth 
having comes because we have earned it. There is but 
one way to earn anything — that is to find out the laws 
which govern production, and to shape our actions in 
accordance with these laws. Good luck never comes to 
the capable man as a surprise. He is prepared for it, 
because it was the very thing he has a right to expect. 
Sooner or later, and after many hard raps, every man 
who lives long enough will find this out. When he 



THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION 



does so, he has the key to success, though it may be too 
late to use it. 

It is the work of the school to give these laws 
reality in the mind of the student. The school can 
bring the student face to face with these laws, and 
even teach him to make them do his bidding. If we 
work with them, these laws are as tractable as the 
placid flow of a mighty river. If we struggle against 
them, they make the terrible havoc of an uncontrolled 
flood. To ignore them is to defy them. From our 
knowledge of the laws of nature arise the achieve- 
ments of civilization. These are our knowledge 
wrought into action. The thing we understand be- 
comes our servant. Whatever we know we can have. 
But whatever we conquer, our victory is a triumph 
of knowledge. 

We speak of this age as the age of inventions, the 
age of man's conquest of the forces of nature. But the 
man who invents or constructs machinery is not the 
conqueror. It is easy for one to harness the lightning 
when another has shown him the lightning's nature and 
ways. It is easier still to repeat what others have done. 
The applications of science are only an incident in the 
growth of science. The electric light and the locomo- 
tive follow sooner or later, as a matter of course, when 
we have found the laws which govern electric currents 
and the expansive power of steam. It is this knowl- 
edge which gives control over the forces of nature. 
It is by investigation, not through application or 
repetition, that man's power advances. It is the inves- 



MAY 18 191* 



THE PRACTICAL EDUCATION 



tigator who comes in contact with the unveiled 
ways of God. The applications of electricity to com- 
mon purposes have been for the most part made in our 
day, but the knowledge on which they are based goes 
back to the earliest investigators of physical laws. 
These men forced their way into the infinite darkness, 
regardless of the multitude that would crowd into their 
path. An investigator is the cause of a thousand inven- 
tors. A Faraday or a Helmholtz is the parent of a 
thousand Edisons. Without the help of the university 
Edisons are possible. Only the highest training can 
make a Helmholtz ; for no man can reach the highest 
rank who has not entered into all the work of all his 
predecessors. 

And this brings me to say that the great work of a 
university is to be the center of investigation. It 
should be the source of new truths — of new conquests 
in every field. To it will come for the brief course of 
training and guidance many who, in the maturity of 
their lives, will accomplish much good for their fellow- 
men. In the ever-increasing circle of human knowl- 
edge new fields are being constantly opened. The 
whole knowledge of the last generation must be taken 
for granted as the basis of advancement for the next. 
Not till the circle of human knowledge has widened to 
infinity, shall we comprehend the infinite goodness 
of God. 




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